APUSH Chapter 9: The Confederation and the Constitution
Chapter Summary The Articles of Confederation, the first government set up after the American Revolution, was structured out of fear of a strong government. Therefore, the Articles were purposely very weak. Two things that showed the weakness of the Articles were its inability to regulate commerce, and Shays’ Rebellion, leading many to fear the possibility that mobs might just take over and the government would be too weak to stop them. Due to these reasons, the Constitutional Convention was held. The Constitution was written as a balancing act between strengthening the government, yet making sure it didn't get too strong. The resulting government was indeed stronger, but a system of checks and balances was put into place to ensure that no one branch became like the king had been After some negotiating, mostly with the promise of the Bill of Rights, the Constitution was ratified. Chapter Outline *The exodus of 80K+ Loyalists left a lack of conservatives, which allowed Patriot elites to emerge *The Congregational Church continued to be legally established by some New England states, but the Anglican Church was humbled and reformed as the Protestant Episcopal Church *In 1774, the Continental Congress called for the abolition of slavery, and in 1775, the Philadelphia Quakers founded the world's first antislavery society *The new spirit that "all men are created equal" even inspired a few slave owners to free their slaves *Women were still unequal to men, even though some served in the Revolutionary War *New Jersey's 1776 constitution allowed women to vote for a short time *Mothers devoted to their families were developed as an idea of republican motherhood, which elevated women to higher statuses as keepers of the nation's conscience *The Continental Congress of 1776 called upon colonies to draft new consitutions *Many states had written documents that represented a fundamental law *Every state created weak executive and judicial branches since they distrusted power due to Britain's abuse of it *Most states gave sweeping power to the legislatuve branch *Many state capitals followed the migration of people and moved westward *After the Revolution, Loyalist land was seized *Goods formally imported from England were cut off, forcing Americans to make their own *Although America's once-great-trade with Britain was now gone, they could now trade with any country they wanted *Yankee shippers like the Empress of China in 1784 ventured into far off places *Inflation was rampant and taxes were hated *In 1786, Britain flooded America with cheap goods, greatly hurting American industries *Americans were still far from united, though they were similar in their state consitutions, political inheritance from Britain, and they were fortunate in their great political leaders *The new states chose a confederation as their first government, allowing states to pretty much be able to do their own thing, just like how states created their own individual currencies and tax barriers during the war *The Articles of Confederation was finished in 1777 and completely ratified in 1781 *States like New York and Virginia had huge tracts of land west of the Appalachians that they could sell to pay off their debts, while other states could not do so *As a compromise, these lands were ceded to the government, which pledged to dispense them for the common good of the union *The Articles purposely set up a weak government in order to avoid a strong national government that would take away unalienable rights or abuse its power *The Articles had no executive branch and a weak Congress that allowed each state only one vote, required 2/3 majority on anything important, and votes were fully unanimous for amendments *Congress was also weak in that it could not regulate commerce, it could not enforce tax collection, and it could only call up soldiers from the states, who weren't going to help each other *States were printing their own, worthless paper money and they competed with one another for foreign trade *The government was a model of what a loose confederation should be, and it was a significant stepping-stone towards the establishment of the US Constitution *The Land Ordinance of 1785 provided that the Old Northwest be sold in order to pay off national debt, and it determined how the new lands of the Ohio Valley would be divided up *The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 determined how new states would be made through a two stage affair, in which the area would first be subordinated to the federal government, and then once it reached a population of 60K, they would write a consitution and apply for statehood *Britain still refused to repeal its Navigation Laws, so it closed down trading to the US *With the help of the Allen brothers and Britain's chain of military posts on US soil, Britain sought to annex Vermont *They justified this by saying that the soldiers had to make sure the US honor its treaty and pay back debts to Loyalists *In 1784, Spain closed to Mississippi River to American commerce and claimed a large area near the Gulf of Mexico that was ceded to the US by Britain *It held a strategic fort at Natchez, which was disputed soil *By encouraging English tribes to be restless, both Spain and England managed to prevent the US from controlling half of its territory *France demanded payments of US debts to France *North African pirates, such as the Dey of Algiers, ravaged US ships in their area and enslaved Yankee sailors, and unfortunately, America was too weak to stop them *States were refusing to pay taxes and national debt was mounting *Boundary disputes erupted into small battles while states taxed goods from other states *In 1786, Shays' rebelled because he was disgruntled over getting farmland mortgages *He was convicted, but later pardoned, however this rebellion motivated people to desire a stronger federal government *Many people began to doubt the Articles of Confederation and republicanism as a whole, whereas others believed that the Articles merely needed to be strengthened *Prosperity began to emerge, congress began to control commerce, and overseas shipping was regaining its place in the world *A convention was called in Annapolis to address the Articles' inability to regulate commerce, but only five states represented, so they met again on May 25, 1787 to revise the Articles *The 55 delegates that attended were well-off, young, and eager to preserve the union, protect American democracy from abroad and preserve it at home, and to curb the unrestrained democracy rampant in various states *The delegates decided to completely scrap the Articles and make a new Consitution *Virginia's large state plan called for Congressional representation based on state population, while New Jersey's small state plan called for equal representation from all states *The Great Compromise made it so Congress would have two houses, the House of Representatives where representation would be based on population, and the Senate, where each state received two representatives *There would also be a separate, independent execute branch with a president who would be military commander-in-chief and who could veto legislation *The president would be elected by the Electoral College, rather than by the people directly, as the people were viewed as too ignorant to vote *Slaves would count as 3/5 of a person in census counts for representation *After 1807, the Constitution enabled a state to shut off lave importation if it wanted *The delegates at the Constitution believed in a system with checks and balances, and the conservatives erected safeguards against excesses of mobs, such as federal chief justices being appointed for life and senators being elected by state legislators *People essentially voted for 1/2 of 1/3 of the government, but they still had power, and the government was based on the people *The Constitution was signed on September 17, 1787 *Knowing that state legislatures would certainly veto the new Constitution, the Founding Fathers sent copies of it out to state conventions, where it could be debated and voted upon *Federalists favored the Constitution, whereas Antifederalists were opposed to it *Federalists were more respectable, many of which were former Loyalists, and they lived nearer the coast in older areas *Antifederalists, the majority of which were illiterate, poor western farmers that were devoted to states' rights, viewed the Constitution as antidemocratic and decried the dropping of annual elections of congressional representatives, the erecting of Washington DC, and the creation of a standing army *Four small states, plus Pennsylvania, quickly ratified the Constitution, Massachusetts ratified it after being promised the addition of a bill of rights, and finally on June 21, 1778, the Constitution was officially adopted after nine states ratified it *Since Virginia knew that it could not be an independent state, they decided to ratify it *New York finally ratified it after being swayed by The Federalist Papers and realizing that they couldn't prosper apart from the union *North Carolina and Rhode Island finally ratified it after intense pressire from the government *Only about 1/4 of adult white males in the country had voted for the ratifying delegates *Conservationism was victorious, as the safeguards had been erected against mob-rule excesses *Federalists belieed that every branch of government effectively represented the people, unlike Antifederalists who believed that only the legislative branch did so